


Mutterings of the Past

by Ruunkur



Series: Rise from Ash [3]
Category: Homestuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-12-09 01:31:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11658807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruunkur/pseuds/Ruunkur
Summary: In which Karkat questions his past self's motives.





	Mutterings of the Past

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place three years after the end of Rising From the Ashes

You glance over your steaming cup of coffee, watching the angry man deflate on your couch with a raised eyebrow. It had been three years since the wedding. In that time, most of the newly remembering trolls had scattered to the high winds. You watch Karkat for a moment, setting your coffee down and clearing your throat.

"Are you trying to become one with my couch?" You ask, his gaze snapping up to you, like he had forgotten you were there. "Not that I don't mind, Kanaya is currently working a fashion show and won't' return for several more weeks. You are welcome to take up all the space you need until her return."

"I promised Dave of all people, that we would still be together after we walked through the door." Karkat groans, his words muffled by his oversized turtleneck. "And what did I do at the end? I fled back to a life I hated. And what have I been doing since? Nothing,"

"You have developed your own bonds with people you care for equally as much outside of a situation where there were less than ten people on the meteor for three years. One of which was shoved into a refrigerator for the duration of that flight." You say easily, leaning forward thoughtfully. "Karkat, what has you so worked up? Are you not happy? I know Dave is happy. He hasn't been happier in years. I think he at least enjoys the fact that you are friends."

"But what about right after?" Karkat asks. "Sollux says Dave is completely fine, but... I don't know, I feel like him seeing me just hurts him instead."

"Dave and I, and the others to a lesser extent, were extremely unhappy when we found that you had disappeared; that you didn't stay with us. We crafted this world and, with your disappearance, we were unable to mature a mother grub. I felt like shit for ages afterwards because I felt like I failed Kanaya. Dave... he has his own set of issues. Have you seen him since you regained your memories? More than just brief passings because of SOllux living between your apartments." You inquire, getting a second cup of coffee and setting it in front of you. "I will continue this conversation, if you join me at the table. I even have high quality coffee for you."

You watch as he bounces from the couch and darts over to the table, taking the offered coffee mug and a seat. "To answer your question, I haven't really talked to Dave? He is still dating Sollux. I have been trying to avoid the conversation and I think he's doing the same? He puts up the stpuid facade he had on the meteor whenever we happen to see each other, which isn't very often. Sollux is fed up and says we need to get over ourselves. But what if he hates me for what I did?"

"From what I recall, your relationship with Dave was always... Built on the irony. You never showed much of it to those on the meteor, but you were close." You say, taking a sip of your coffee. "He never talked about the details. He and I did spend years searching for any sign of you or Kanaya, I will admit. We both gave up after awhile. It became too much."

"No!" Karkat snaps. "I mean, yes, we were close but it was not built on the bullshit irony that Dave liked to parade around. We... It's confusing, but we were close. And at the end of it... There were flushed feelings Rose. And I ignored all of that."

"Did you know what was going to happen when you chose to be a troll?" You ask.

"Well, no... I thought it was asking if we wanted to be a troll or human in the new world." Karkat frowns. "How does this help?"

"And how would you sort your relationship with Gamzee and Sollux?" You ask, curious now that he had memories of the quadrants back. You file away his question for the moment, knowing it would loop back around.

"Sollux would be... A more black leaning relationship, but it's still pretty fucking flushed. And Gamzee is flushed, but we had to work out just why he went and killed Equius and Nepeta. Do you know how weird relationship therapy is when you can't tell the therapist why you're there? Besides the point, Lord English had planted a juju with one or both of the Striders, Lil' Cal and the darkness had infected Gamzee on the meteor. That's the reason he went clown crazy and ended up working with the guy. As for before hand, I believe if he still had his shitty faith, he would have been fine. Even after going off Sopor originally, he had been okay. Then Dave sends a video of the stupid clowns, and he snaps." Karkat shuts his mouth, taking a sip of the coffee after a moment, impressed with the taste.

"Are you still with Gamzee?" You ask, silently impressed by the information.

"I mean... There for awhile, it was touch and go. But you have to admit, we are different from our Alternian selves. The only time he hurt someone was they were hurting him first." Karkat admits, shoulders slumping. "I care for him on a level I can't describe. Seren-fucking-dipty after all,"

"The scars on his face?" You inquire. "Those were from when he was younger?"

"His dad flipped out and went after him when we were in our first year of high school. He stuck a knife in the old bastard and showed up, bleeding, at my parents' place. Dad let him in, patched him up, and refused to give custody back to Gamzee's father. The guy ended up in prison for charges of child abuse." Karkat sighs. "He is different from his Alternian self. He was terrified that he had killed his old man and ended up calling the police to report a break in before he calmed down enough for dad to help him."

"Yes, you are correct." You say, setting your empty mug down and linking your fingers together. "I think that you and Dave need to sit down and talk. I am sure he understands that it is not your fault that the game gave you a choice. None of us knew what was going to happen at the end of it Karkat. We could not have predicted, with all the seers and mind players, we could not have kown. It was a mystery, the new world."

"I... When I was given the choice, I chose to be a troll." Karkat says after a moment. "I thought... I thought I would be here, but that I... I don't know Rose. Faced with that choice, I thought I would be given a chance to start a new life. But no, I ended up being the same mutant blood that I always was on Alternia. But this time, we got to defeat the Condesce. Feferi had plans of new reform. We were doing better than we had been when we played the game. But, we didn't know the game. I still think we don't know the game. I stopped dreaming about Alternia. Now I'm dreaming about the memories of the game, of how it went wrong. Of the dream bubbles..."

"What were you thinking when you were given the choice?" You ask, taking note of Karkat's tense body language.

"That I would get another chance to not fuck up." Karkat admits. "But it looks like, by choosing troll, I got my wish. And I got to be human... But what happens to us now? You and the others have lived since the beginnings of his world. You're gods in your own right. You could take that claim. But you continue living in patterns. Fuck, you and Dave even went back to school recently." Karkat says and you have to laugh.

"We went back because of Sollux and Kanaya. Dave was coming home one day and recognized them, in some small ways. He knew Kanaya cause she sat at a bus stop and did some sewing. He knew Sollux because of his....I'm not actually sure about that one. So, he made us younger, we had Roxy and Dirk forge and sign papers and sent us to school. We missed you all the most." You say. "And, as for your relationship with Gamzee, the game is in the past. You are different people here. As long as he keeps his kill count set at zero, I believe there won't be any problems. But I still think you need to talk to Dave. Avoiding him while one of your partners is in a relationship with him is just going to put unnecessary stress on both relationships."

"Sometimes, I catch him staring in the mirror, tracing over the scars that are so similar to the ones Nepeta gave him. And he's crying because he remembers. And he feels guilty about it. Gamzee, that is. You know he wrote Equius and Nepeta a three page each apologize note after the wedding?" Karkat fiddles with his mug, taking another sip. He is avoiding the other half of your statement, avoiding the subject of Dave as best as he could and you sigh.

"Would someone who is truly a killer be that remorseful?" You ask, impressed with Gamzee.

"No,"

"Than what are you worried about?"

"That he'll kill again. That he'll slip up and kill our friends, even if he doesn't mean it." Karkat says finally, the silence following heavy as you collect your thoughts. "If it happened once..."

"It can happen again. However, if he does try to kill again, we will kill him." You state, voice hard.

"You'll be in a long line if everyone who's told me that keeps to their word." Karkat says and then laughs. "I've been thinking about it a lot, and I do like Dave still. But I don't want him thinking I'm throwing myself at him because I remembered what we had. I had a crush on him when Sollux brought him around the first time. But... I don't know Rose,"

"I had to listen to him for months after the game ended and we created our world here. He was a mess for nearly two years after, Karkat. We all were to be honest. There was so much psycological damage that had to be repaired. But see, none of the trolls made it through. Only we humans did. It wasn't like you were the only one that didn't come through. And then, we started seeing small signs of your groups through the ages. A knight in a castle I visited once reminded me of you. With less of a shouting personality, but still you. I recall Dave telling me of a seamstress he ran into in the early fifteen hundreds that screamed Kanaya. A man that was a little too happy, a wide grin in the eighteen hundreds that John had the unexpected pleasure of running into at a carnival of all things. Little shadows of you, throughout history." You explain and you remember trying to chase and grasp those shadows. None of them ever compared to the shadows you found in this century.

"When the severing happened, it was mentioned that we had been chasing shadows of ourselves." Karkat says, his eyes closed. He crossed his arms on the table, resting his head in them and looking up at you. "I even talked it over with Sollux. But... If we did have other lives on this planet, none of us can remember. I get letters from most of them; Eridan called recently and had a long list of apologizes that he had to get through. The others know what happened, who they killed, was wrong."

"Your soul will feel what you have done in the past. And you will come to understand that, at the time, perhaps that was the only thing that could have come at it. And how did that conversation with Sollux go?" You press.

"He thinks it's a natural reaction that I still have feelings for Dave, and that, as a species as a whole, we are more used to a multiple relationship factor. Gamzee was even okay with the idea if I wanted to date Dave." Karkat sighs, hiding his face completely. "But I don't know... What if what I'm feeling is literally a fucking shadow? What if I end up hurting Dave more?"

"As far as I'm aware, the only ones that stuck around this town are you, Gamzee, Sollux, and Kanaya. Am I correct?" You ask. The week after the wedding had been a confusing mess as the trolls made human remembered the game. Several had end up leaving quickly. Vriska had claims of not letting her ship get taken and Nepeta and Equius had vanished shortly after. Terezi had stayed several nights to talk with Dave before absconding and disappearing off the face of the planet. The fish trolls had left after a tense conversation with Sollux. And among all of this, the current life they lived on Alternia floated to the surface. Though many admitted that the dreams stopped, they could not remember past the meeting of the humans on the ship.

"Yeah," Karkat says finally. "We have plans to meet up in two years, see how everyone is doing. But...I think that we just need time to process everything that's happened. Everything we knew, it was a lie."

"I remember when we first completed the game. We celebrated John's birthday, then just went on our ways. We didn't talk to each other for years. We still had our technology which worked, even in the darker ages of the world. We could keep in touch, we had our powers. But we needed time to understand everything we've been through. I think you're group is doing the same. And you have more drama to sort through." You comment, glancing up when the doorbell to the apartment rang. "Give me one moment,"

You get up from the table, turning and heading to the door and opening it. "Good morning Dave, what brings you around this early?" You ask, voice carrying back to Karkat in the kitchen.

"Sollux says Karkat is sulking and went to talk to you. I have been trying to pin him down for the last week, but the guy is slippier than a juggalo sliding through vents." Dave says, his shades reflecting your expression of restrained disbelief.

"References to juggalos can be kept at the door." You comment. "But you are welcome to come in. I would not be surprised if Karkat has not found a way to disappear yet."

"Right, no comments on juggalos." Dave says and glancing over your shoulder into the apartment, making eye contact with Karkat and offering him a little wave.

"Well, come on in." You say, standing to the side and waving Dave in. Maybe it wasn't that great that Kanaya had a fashion show to attend to. You would use the extra help right now. "Would you like any coffee Dave?"

"No thanks," Dave says, taking a seat on the table. "Hey Karkat,"

"Hey Dave," he says, his face hidden underneath his arms. "How are you?"

"Pretty good," Dave says with a nod. "Look, I know you've been ignoring my calls on purpose but... Can we just talk? Before you ask, Sollux told me where you were going. Don't be mad at him. It took a lot to drag it out of him, he is still in once piece though."

"I feel like I hurt you," Karkat said without much prompting, looking at Dave. "What you told me before we stepped through the gate... And then I choose to live as a troll. It was a hasty decision and I didn't understand the consequences. None of us did."

"We were young," Dave says, surprise crossing his face as Karkat talked. "I'm glad that you remember though."

"Are you happy?" Karkat asks and you walk into the bedroom, not hearing Dave's muffled response before you shut the door, letting them have their conversation in private.


End file.
